During the drilling, completion, and production phases of wells for petroleum or water extraction, the downhole use of compositions including crosslinked polymers is important for a wide variety of purposes. Hydraulic fracturing is the use of a pressurized fluid to form fractures in a subterranean material through which petroleum materials can flow to the wellbore. The high viscosity of compositions including crosslinked polymers can be useful for forming and holding open fractures, and can also force suspended proppant deep into fractures. Crosslinked polymers and compositions including the same can also be useful as packer fluids inserted in the annulus between the tubing and casing above a packer to lower pressure differential across the packer and on the wellbore and casing, can be used as a barrier pill to help manage pressure generated downhole, and can be useful as lost circulation materials to mitigate the loss of drilling fluids to formations downhole.
Past techniques to generate crosslinked polymers include mixing a crosslinkable polymer with a crosslinker above the surface to form the crosslinked polymer, and pumping of a composition including the crosslinked polymer to a desired location downhole. Pumping of high viscosity fluids can be energy intensive and difficult. Pumping compositions including highly crosslinked polymers with very high viscosity to a desired downhole location can be difficult or impossible.